Significant attention has been given to newly-constructed high-performing green buildings however, the vast majority of commercial building stock was constructed prior to the green movement without incorporating sustainable design principles and features. Designing and constructing only new commercial buildings to be sustainable is insufficient to materially reduce the burden on the environment caused by commercial buildings given that only 2-3% of total building stock is replaced annually. In order to do so, the commercial real estate industry and users of commercial space must increase their focus on the systems, operations, and management of existing buildings. Because most commercial space is leased, landlords and tenants must address how the lease and the relationship it creates bears on a building’s environmental impact. Several groups have proposed “green” leases to address this issue however many barriers exist that inhibit widespread adoption of a sustainable leasing approach. Effective green leasing processes and principles remain scarcely implemented and understood by the real estate community.
These barriers show up in a number of different formats. First there can be the tendency of the parties and their counsel – who may be unfamiliar with the sustainable leasing process and principles – to focus excessively on certain legal aspects of the lease to the detriment of the process and the parties’ goals. Secondly, a lack of well-known effective approaches to overcome the “split incentive” created by many leases between landlord and tenant related to how each shares the costs and benefits of sustainability-related measures can impede progress. Additionally, the challenging market environment of the past several years has caused many market participants to defer implementing sustainability-related changes in their business practices and leasing operations that may be seen as costly or risky. Finally, many participants are still concerned about unsettled potential legal pitfalls posed by green leasing. Moreover, there is no comprehensive, widely distributed and easily digestible guide to overcoming these barriers and implementing sustainable practices into the leasing process.
This site is intended to foster adoption of sustainable leasing processes and principles with the goal of promoting an environment where landlords and tenants work together to provide a greener workplace such as reducing the user’s external environmental impact and resource consumption while improving the indoor environment and health and productivity of the occupants. Specifically, our goal is to provide the real-estate community with a clear understanding of the value of incorporating sustainable elements in the leasing process, explain the differences between traditional and non-traditional leases (definitions, business value, etc), provide a comparative assessment of existing “green” leasing resources and help a user to identify and select appropriate templates to apply to the leasing process and document their lease relationship.
This site’s intent is to address the various market dynamics and lease scenarios, such as multi-tenant vs. single-tenant buildings and certified buildings vs. non-certified buildings, advocate for continual improvement of operations and systems (rather than one-time attainment of a given rating), and discuss strategies for implementing green leasing practices in existing leases through customization of available resources by a given user.